Donald Norman On Software And Other Things

small but... writes "New Scientist has published an interview with Donald Norman in which Norman comments on open source (disparagingly), usability (of course), machine 'emotion' (Ha!), and security (Breaking news: social engineering still #1 risk)."

Comments

I'm unimpressed and have suspicions.

[twitter]

In this article he says, " I never look back at the stuff I've done. I look forward to where I'm going," and then tells us what an idiot he is. He berates his own shallow research and how much he screwed up his last book. Right now, I think he needs some more research.

Posting from Mozilla on Window Maker on Debian, I have to say that his user interface comments are way off the mark. Free Software is free to combine the best interfaces with the best answer to any particular problem. Sure, that makes for some inconsitency as the right tool for the job is never a universal. Just the same I've gotten used to the particular interfaces I like and now think of them as far easier than the M$ junk I use at work and even Apple stuff. If he wants to be the tyrant of an interface, he's welcome to make one or even to simply make some constructive comments. Oh wait, I see, he and the people he works for consider such stuff "intellectual property" that can be owned so that best practices never go very far.

His website would benifit from a more modular approach. Everything is thrown out in one big long scroll down page. Stuff like his background should be a link to two kilobytes of text with links instead of a too short to be useful with no links paragraph. Recent articles and publications should also be links. The sidebar is full and distracting rather than informative and useful. Why would I take this man's opinion about software design seriously when his site so clearly misses the pull nature of html? Oh wait, now I see, he thinks of his web page as an advertisment rather than a means of sharing information.

I'm starting to see a patern and it's name is greed. The things he bemoans are the direct result of his own way of thinking. The only thing he gets right in the article is that many cheap gadgets have poor interfaces. Who is not sick of having to read a manual to learn how to use yet another black box that is a toaster or microwave oven? This has little to do with software design and his mixing the two up is the result of ignorance or malice. His ingorance of the world of free software is less than forgivable from a design expert. His disparagement of software licenses that give the user the ability to run software for any purpose, modify that software as the user pleases and share those modifications, is likewise the result of unforgivable ignorance or malice. Take the blinders off, Don, you might like what you see.

Wow

[Manhattan Project]

This guy's dumb.